Monday, October 20, 2025

Polaris of Enlightenment

New media subsidy policy could lead to death of newspapers

Published 7 December 2023
– By Editorial Staff
Minister for Culture Parisa Liljestrand presents the new media subsidy policy at a press conference.
3 minute read

Just on November 15, the Swedish Parliament passed the new Media Subsidy Act, which means that the current press subsidy system will disappear at the end of the year. The changes are believed to hit smaller newspapers and those critical of the regime particularly hard, and Ulrika Hyllert, president of the Swedish Journalists’ Union, is very critical of the design of the new support.

– This means that the impact of media support on media diversity in Sweden will now depend on the goodwill of the Media Support Board, she says.

The Swedish Journalists’ Union believes that it is unclear how the media support will actually be distributed and is concerned that there is no guarantee that “media that contribute to media diversity will be prioritized” when the money is distributed.

– For us, media diversity is not primarily about the color of the editorial page. For us as a union it is important that there are many different, viable media owners in Sweden. It’s a question of the future and something that politicians should take more seriously, says Ulrika Hyllert, adding that newsrooms will also have to cut their freelance budgets.

Vavra Suk, editor-in-chief and publisher of Nya Tider, is also very critical of the whole process and does not know whether the newspaper will receive the new media subsidy, as there are no detailed regulations yet and decisions will not be made until April 2024 at the earliest.

“Transitional support”, which would help newspapers eligible for press subsidies to better manage the transition to the new system, will also not be paid until April – during these six months they will be completely without state support.

“However, alternative media like Nya Tider will be hit the hardest, and it seems that we are also being targeted. We already work in a hostile environment where, for example, the cartelization of the Swedish printing industry limits our possibilities. We are also unable to generate significant income from advertising, as politically correct newspapers do”, Suk writes.

Left-wing newspapers collapse

The Socialist Justice Party is also very negative about the changes and believes that the bourgeois and SD-backed government is actively trying to strangle left-wing newspapers financially.

“Offensiv and other left-wing newspapers could be completely without state support next year. And if Offensiv continues to receive support, it will be significantly less than before, and within a few years it will be zero crowns. Moreover, if the paper does receive funding in 2024, it will not be paid out until April, forcing the paper to make cuts at the beginning of the year. This is a deliberate attempt to cut off the legs of Offensiv and other newspapers that are not published by profit-making media groups”, the paper writes.

The left-wing newspaper ETC has also warned that it will lose a lot of money with the new policy.

“A new media subsidy will be introduced at the turn of the year, but nobody knows what it means yet. But one thing is clear: there will be less money for Dagens ETC. In 2023, Dagens ETC will have 20 million in press subsidies. In 2024 it could be wiped out”, they warn.

But minister of culture Parisa Liljestrand says that “the basic idea has always been a technology-neutral system that targets the media that really need support”.

– This is to promote a more long-term sustainability, even for small players. From a democratic perspective, it is important to protect local journalism throughout the country, she claims.

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Youth unemployment edges down in Sweden

Published 15 October 2025
– By Editorial Staff
At the end of September, 363,000 people were registered as unemployed in Sweden.
1 minute read

Unemployment continues to decline and stood at 6.9 percent at the end of September, according to new figures from Arbetsförmedlingen (the Swedish Public Employment Service). Despite the positive trend, the unemployment level remains high compared to the previous year.

At the end of September, just over 363,000 people were registered as unemployed in Sweden. This marks the second consecutive month of declining unemployment figures. However, compared to the same period last year, unemployment has increased, the statistics show.

It is obviously gratifying that unemployment has decreased for two months in a row, but compared to a year ago, approximately 4,000 more people are registered as unemployed. The unemployment level is therefore still high, says Lars Lindvall, chief forecaster at Arbetsförmedlingen, in a press release.

A positive signal is that the number of unemployed young people continues to decrease. At the end of September, 43,554 young people between 18 and 24 years old were registered as unemployed, a decrease from 45,378 the year before.

The statistics also show that 34,668 people found employment during September, an increase from 30,462 in the same month last year. The number of redundancy notices simultaneously decreased sharply, from 7,586 to 5,057 people.

Interest in climate issues declining among young Swedish women

The exaggerated climate crisis

Published 14 October 2025
– By Editorial Staff
According to a recent report, an increasing number of young women are turning away from climate alarmist issues.
2 minute read

Engagement with climate issues among young women is declining sharply, according to a recent survey. Meanwhile, issues such as healthcare, education, and crime are being prioritized increasingly higher.

A recently conducted survey reveals that young Swedish women are becoming significantly less passionate about modern left-leaning values such as climate alarmism.

According to the report Youth Focus 2025, climate issues have lost ground among Sweden’s young people. In 2019, 51 percent of young women considered climate the most important issue.

In this year’s report, the corresponding figure has dropped to 15 percent. Among young men, engagement has fallen from 34 to 13 percent.

We don’t talk much about climate, only in school, says 15-year-old Disa Magnusson in Södertälje, a city south of Stockholm, to publicly funded broadcaster SVT.

At the same time, the survey shows that young people today are more engaged in societal issues that affect their daily lives. Healthcare tops the list, followed by education and crime.

In this year’s report, we see a generation that feels concern about certain societal issues and wants to act for society’s benefit here and now, says Sofia Rasmussen, CEO of Rasmussen Analysis.

The same survey also demonstrates declining interest in feminism and gender equality among the country’s youth.

New priorities

Several of the young women who expressed themselves in the survey report that they feel greater trust in more conservative parties. Parties that profile themselves around more traditional values, with emphasis on order and security.

This is a development that could significantly impact Sweden’s future politics, especially when a generation that previously often identified with supposedly progressive left-wing values now shows a shift in interest and engagement.

Interviews with young women show that issues such as friendship, love, and high school are prioritized higher than climate.

People probably think they won’t be alive then, says Disa Magnusson about why climate issues don’t engage as much as before.

The survey demonstrates a clear shift toward issues perceived as more urgent and directly relevant in the daily lives of today’s youth.

At the same time, interest in long-term societal problems remains, but engagement has changed both in form and expression.

About the Youth Focus Survey

Youth Focus 2025, produced for the tenth consecutive year by the King's Foundation for Young Leadership (Konungens stiftelse Ungt Ledarskap) and Rasmussen Analys, aims to highlight young people's values and attitudes and to strengthen their role in society and working life.

This year's report is based on responses from 1,280 people, of which 1,018 are young people between 15–29 years old. The survey was conducted during the period May 13–20, 2025. To enable comparisons with other age groups, the survey also collected 262 responses from people born before 1995.

This makes it possible to distinguish what is unique to the younger generation from broader societal trends, while also enabling an analysis of how older respondents perceive and describe today's youth.

Source: Youth Focus 2025

More minors in Sweden are facing trial for serious offenses

organized crime

Published 14 October 2025
– By Editorial Staff
A conviction ruling means that a court determines guilt, but since children under 15 are not criminally responsible in Sweden, no sentence is imposed.
1 minute read

The number of children under 15 who are brought to trial in so-called evidentiary proceedings has increased sharply over the past year. A large proportion of the cases involve murder and attempted murder.

Up to and including September this year, 68 children under 15 have been brought to trial in evidentiary proceedings. This is nearly double compared to the entire previous year, when 38 children were processed in this type of case. The year before that, in 2023, the number was only seven cases, according to the Swedish Prosecution Authority (Åklagarmyndigheten).

Senior prosecutor Maria Franzén at the Swedish Prosecution Authority sees the increase as a consequence of rising crime rates among children and young people.

Since the proportion of children participating in this type of crime is increasing, it’s an expected effect that the number of cases with evidentiary proceedings also increases, she tells Swedish public radio SR.

Not criminally responsible

Of the 68 children, a full 43 are suspected of involvement in murder, preparation for murder, or attempted murder. Among the high-profile cases is a then 13-year-old boy who allegedly shot and killed a person with connections to criminal networks inside a restaurant.

An evidentiary proceeding means that a court determines the question of guilt, but since children under 15 are not criminally responsible under Swedish law, no sentence is imposed.

Evidentiary proceedings are a good tool for social services to implement appropriate interventions for these children who have committed these crimes, says August Knutsson at the Swedish Police Authority’s national operations center.

Swedish deputy PM seeks ban on burqa and niqab

The Islamization of Europe

Published 13 October 2025
– By Editorial Staff
Busch argues that the veils express a strict interpretation of Islam that conflicts with Swedish values.
2 minute read

Christian Democrat leader Ebba Busch proposes a ban on burqa and niqab in public spaces. She argues that the ban is needed to combat honor-based oppression, among other things.

The proposal is part of a “development initiative for increased social cohesion” that a working group within the Christian Democrats (KD) has prepared for the autumn.

Busch argues that niqab and burqa are expressions of a strict interpretation of Islam that is incompatible with Swedish values.

Islam must adapt in Sweden. One can be a proud Swedish Muslim, Christian, Jew, atheist, but it is fundamental Swedish values that must apply to all of us, she tells the Schibsted newspaper Aftonbladet.

She points out that Sweden must “wake up” from the naivety that has placed the country in a culture war where more and more people live under honor-based oppression.

It is that type of very naive liberalism, or lax Social Democrat politics, that has brought Sweden to the situation we are in today. With a failed integration that currently means that approximately a quarter of a million young people in Sweden are estimated to live under honor-based oppression-like circumstances.

“Both women’s oppression and honor-based oppression”

The ban would cover, for example, public places such as squares, shopping centers and healthcare facilities. The proposal has not yet been anchored with the other Tidö parties (the Swedish center-right governing coalition). However, opposition leader Magdalena Andersson of the Social Democrats (S) says she is prepared to discuss such a ban.

Both burqa and niqab are expressions of both women’s oppression and honor-based oppression, and that is something we Social Democrats distance ourselves from. Exactly how to deal with it, I am prepared to discuss and look at, says Andersson during yesterday’s party leader debate on SVT.

In Denmark, a similar ban was voted through in 2018, which means that covering one’s face in public places is prohibited.

During the Christian Democrats’ party congress in November, the proposal will be put to a vote.

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